He does it right

I was of course saddened by the news that Wilko Johnson has terminal cancer, but heartened to hear that he is going to play a handful of euphemistically titled "farewell" dates. The Daily Telegraph has wrongly (I think) reported that he is going to play these concerts with "former band" Dr Feelgood. I doubt it. Wilko has a perfectly good backing band of his own and apart from a band that tours under that name, "Dr Feelgood" does not exist. At least not in any meaningful sense. The members of this "Dr Feelgood" band have little or no connection with the original members and apart from Lee Brilleaux, none of them ever played with a founder member. They are not even original replacements of original members; indeed the guitarist is the fifth incarnation of the role originally held by Wilco Johnson.

Does this matter? I mean, does it matter that bands tour as a shadow of their former selves? After all, nobody reckons the Berlin Philharmonic has gone down hill since Von Karajan left. Or maybe they do. Its probably a false comparison because the Berlin Phil don't even write their own material and nobody can tell you the name of their original first violin player, let alone their current conductor, without looking it up.

Remember "Three Wheels on my Wagon"? The New Christy Minstrels, a staple of Children's Favourites and a blatantly commercial folk outfit had a hit with it in 1962. Gene Clark was in it, he of the Byrds. David Crosby wrote about The New Christy Minstrels in the first volume of his autobiography. I am quoting from memory but the gist is that, when the NCMs became well known, their manager found that he was overbooked and so he hit on the idea of touring several versions of The New Christy Minstrels at the same time, since nobody had any real idea who was in it. I suppose the moral of this story is that anybody can sing, "Three Wheels on my Wagon", but only Crosby can sing "Almost Cut my Hair". (And quite deliberately, nobody can tour as "Crosby, Stills & Nash" apart from CSN themselves - a deliberate factor in the choosing of their stage name)

Strangely, Wilko does the vocals when he plays these days. He murders "Roxette" and "She Does it Right" and sounds nothing like Lee Brilleaux. But hey. Who cares? Its Wilko; mad, strutting, guitar-gunning Wilko and he will always be the heart and soul of a sound that went a long way beyond the Thames Delta.